American Aquarium
For nearly two decades, American Aquarium have pushed toward that rare form of rock-and-roll that’s revelatory in every sense. “For us the sweet spot is when you’ve got a rock band that makes you scream along to every word, and it’s not until you’re coming down at three a.m. that you realize those words are saying something real about your life,” says frontman BJ Barham. “That’s what made us fall in love with music in the first place, and that’s the goal in everything we do.” On their new album The Fear of Standing Still, the North Carolina-bred band embody that dynamic with more intensity than ever before, endlessly matching their gritty breed of country-rock with Barham’s bravest and most incisive songwriting to date. As he reflects on matters both personal and sociocultural—e.g., the complexity of Southern identity, the intersection of generational trauma and the dismantling of reproductive rights—American Aquarium instill every moment of The Fear of Standing Still with equal parts unbridled spirit and illuminating empathy. Recorded live at the legendary Sunset Sound in Los Angeles, The Fear of Standing Still marks American Aquarium’s second outing with producer Shooter Jennings—a three-time Grammy winner who also helmed production on 2020’s critically lauded Lamentations, as well as albums from the likes of Brandi Carlile and Tanya Tucker. In a departure from the stripped-down subtlety of 2022’s Chicamacomico (a largely acoustic rumination on grief), the band’s tenth studio LP piles on plenty of explosive riffs and hard-charging rhythms, bringing a visceral energy to the most nuanced and poetic of lyrics. While American Aquarium bring a lived-in intimacy to all of The Fear of Standing Still, songs like “Cherokee Purples” encompass a particularly tender emotionality. A wistful reminiscence of all the charmed and wild summers of Barham’s youth, the track unfolds in so many gorgeously detailed images (kudzu vines and fireflies, menthol cigarettes and Big League Chew), each rendered with a loving specificity that lingers in the listener’s heart. “‘Cherokee Purples’ came from me making a tomato sandwich in my kitchen, and immediately getting taken back to all the summer days when we’d get dropped off at my grandmother’s so my parents could go to work,” says Barham. “It’s crazy how something as simple as a tomato sandwich with Duke’s Mayonnaise can take me to a whole other world, but to me it’s almost like a talisman of where I’m from and how I was raised.” Meanwhile, on “The Curse of Growing Old,” American Aquarium look to the other end of the life spectrum, conjuring a life-affirming mood despite the song’s excruciating honesty. For Barham, the sharing of hard truths is indelibly tied to his sense of devotion to American Aquarium’s audience—and to his belief in rock-and-roll as a singularly unifying force. “All I really want to do is put words to the emotions that most people have a difficult time expressing on their own,” he reveals. “No matter what that emotion is, when you put it into a song and then get to those moments when a whole bunch of people are singing that song all together, it makes you see that you’re part of something bigger than you ever realized. That’s when you can really affect people’s lives, and to me this record is another stepping stone to making that a reality.”
Heart Attack Man
Most of us fear death, while a small number of us pay no mind to it. Nevertheless, none of us will outrun it. In this respect, it unites us. Exploring our existential fate, Heart Attack Man ponder not just death, but life in between the crunch of palm-muted pop-punk guitar chords and snappy hooks you just can’t shake. As such, the Cleveland, OH trio—Eric Egan [vocals, guitar], Adam Paduch [drums], and Ty Sickels [guitar]—stare down fate with an ear-to-ear smile on their fourth full-length LP, Joyride the Pale Horse [Many Hats Distribution]. “No matter what differences we have, everybody dies,” Eric affirms. “For the album, I wanted to approach the process differently and be more poetic in terms of the subject matter. I was riffing on our acute awareness of mortality. However, the sentiment isn’t, ‘I want to die’ or ‘Everyone I know is dead, and I’m so sad’. It’s more complicated. Getting older, you start grappling with the feelings associated with death and how to contemplate life itself. We’re painting a picture of how complex and nuanced our feelings about death can be.” Since emerging in 2014, Heart Attack Man have consistently sharpened their signature style to knife-point precision with clever lyrics as incisive as their airtight songcraft. This sound naturally progressed across Acid Rain EP [2014], The Manson Family [2017], Fake Blood [2019], Thoughts & Prayerz EP [2021], and Freak of Nature [2023]. Of the latter, Cleveland Magazine urged, “expect to find the high-energy, simmering pop-punk stylings that the band has established in the past few years — just, with more input and new flair.” Brooklyn Vegan christened them “a rare band who feel catchy enough for arenas and punk enough for basements all at once,” and OnesToWatch applauded their “enigmatic instrumentation and cutting lyrics.” Along the way, ceaseless touring shored up a devout audience behind them, and they amassed millions of streams. In 2024, the guys opted to reunite with producer Brett Romnes at “The Barbershop” studio in New Jersey. Musically, they nodded to inspirations as diverse as Hum and Failure as well as Type O Negative, Quicksand, and Unwritten Law. Pushing boundaries, they incorporated different time signatures and coated the soundscape with a thick dose of nineties fuzz. “We returned to the Barbershop with a renewed and rejuvenated appreciation for it,” says Eric. “Getting back in with Brett, it was the perfect meeting of the minds. We all stepped up our game. Musically, we tried things we’ve never done before. We understand what being in Heart Attack Man means and how all of this operates. We upped the energy overall too. We just keep figuring out how to make our band better each year.” “When it comes to this band, it feels like everything we’ve done prepared us for this moment,” he leaves off. “We know what we want to do and who we are. We don’t want to know what life looks like without playing music.”
Eyehategod
JawKneeVee
Bringin’ the circus to Omaha with the wild sounds of JawKneeVee. Joining in the madness is el Jefe and Tumbleweed. The Sydney is the place to be for this night of wonder and amazement. Only $10 to have your mind blown.
Black Ends
✨ BLACK ENDS IS GUNK POP ✨ nicolle swims / guitar / vocals billie paine / drums ben swanson / bass
Ice Nine Kills: Pick Your Poison
Ice Nine Kills craft anthems full of passion and precision. The band’s theatrical bombast created a community of self-described “Psychos” and launched the type of pop culture lore celebrated in their songs. They make timeless and timely music, mixing metalcore, melody, and punk with power. Hard-rock-meets-horror tracks like “Hip to be Scared,” “Funeral Derangements,” “A Grave Mistake,” and “The American Nightmare” demonstrate their unapologetic fascination with fright and cult classic curiosities, unleashed with inescapable melodic hooks, heavy riffs, and clever twists of phrase. Led by Spencer Charnas, Ice Nine Kills spread cavalier carnage with a knowing smile. Their densely catchy songs on their breakthrough albums, The Silver Scream and The Silver Scream 2: Welcome to Horrorwood, propelled them to death-defying new heights. In 2022, they toured with Slipknot. Metallica handpicked Ice Nine Kills to join them on their M72 World Tour in 2023, 2024, and 2025. The horror community Spencer grew up loving has embraced his band in return. INK’s “A Work of Art” (featuring System Of A Down’s Shavo Odadjian) plays in 2024’s Terrifier 3, a No. 1 box office smash that became the highest-grossing unrated film ever. The mischievously gory music video features Art the Clown himself – actor David Howard Thornton – and Terrifier franchise stars Catherine Corcoran and Leah Voysey, alongside Shavo and SiriusXM radio host Jose Mangin. Long before he graced the covers of Rock Sound, Metal Hammer, Revolver, and Outburn, Charnas began his career at a battle of the bands while still in high school. Known simply as “Ice Nine” from 2000 to 2006, Spencer persevered through lineup and stylistic changes as a teenager and young adult. The No. 1 Billboard Hard Rock Album The Silver Scream (2018) mercilessly chopped down the doors, announcing Ice Nine Kills’ arrival as an unrivaled force of unnatural nature. Helpless teens, unhelpful authorities, supernatural forces, masked killers, and “final girls” abounded. Each piece focused on a different horror classic, paying loving homage to Freddy, Jason, Michael, Pennywise, and more. Naturally, there’s always a sequel. The Silver Scream 2: Welcome to Horrorwood imagined a world where Charnas is the chief suspect in his fiancé’s murder. His musical and visual work with Ice Nine Kills is the primary evidence. The album expanded the lore of The Silence, a new slasher for the ages. Loudwire hails Ice Nine Kills as “one of the most unique acts in metal right now.” Visionary trailblazers and multimedia raconteurs, INK hosts a thrilling world for a growing legion of devoted true believers with immersive shows, captivating videos, and an inventive band- and-fan community. Ice Nine Kills blurs the boundaries between truth and fiction, skewering Hollywood in the process, stabbing with a satire to rival Patrick Bateman. As the song “Welcome to Horrorwood” declares: “Stardom’s just an afterthought for all those stabbed in the backlot, piled up and left to rot.” “So, how’s this for an establishing shot?”
PRHYME – SOLD OUT
Cut from the same cloth as the Omaha music scene that birthed them in 1997, PRHYME are a raw, alt-rock band forged in friendship. After a decade-long hiatus, the original trio of Mike Otepka, Dan Peters, and Zak Olsen reignited the fire in 2023, adding Joe Pietro and Scott Irvine to the fold. Now, with a sound honed by years of experience and a renewed sense of purpose, PRHYME are back to deliver a sonic assault that’s as explosive as it is infectious.
Season To Risk
This pioneering Kansas City band has survived fire, flood, tornadoes, and van crashes and lived to talk about it. Season to Risk play a genre-bending mix of heavy indie rock. Singer Steve Tulipana’s captivating stage presence quickly got the band noticed in the early 90s and signed to Columbia (Sony), with vocals in the lineage of Nick Cave and David Yow of Jesus Lizard. The band changed direction with each release, quickly pivoting away from the grunge and nu metal wave, showing a surprisingly diverse range of influences and interests, gradually adding darker noise and synthesizer. Reviews ranged from “the next Soundgarden” (1st record) to “metal for recoveringindie rockers” (2nd record). In 1993, they were selected to perform as a futuristic punk band for the club scene in the film “Strange Days” about the Y2K apocalypse, but their song was cut from the soundtrack for being “too noisy”. Burned and Submerged A series of disasters has tested Season to Risk as if God herself wants their music destroyed. The band blew through a dozen vehicles while touring relentlessly through the 90s, suffering near-death accidents along the way, cracked engines, careening backwards downhill in Seattle with no brakes, and a rollover on an icy stretch of Minnesota highway. They also suffered line up changes with the loss of several early drummers leaving at pivotal moments in the band’s career. No less than four members have left the band to join their alt rock cousins Shiner, also from Kansas City. Tim Dow played drums on early Season to Risk songs but left before the recording of the eponymous debut record. Current Shiner rhythm section Paul Malinowski and Jason Gerken left after the 2nd album “In A PerfectWorld”. And noise guitar prodigy Josh Newton joined Shiner after the 3rd album “Men Are Monkeys. Robots Win.” Season to Risk’s first two album masters burned in the Sony/Universal warehouse fire of 2008, which also claimed 150,000 other master tapes from John Coltrane to Nine Inch Nails. The band’s recording studio was totaled in a flash flood which almost claimed the lives of guitarist Duane Trower and drummer David Silver as they tried to save equipment while muddy water submerged their recording console and ruined the building in 15 minutes. The tape masters for their third album and other clients’ projects were lost in the flood, along with their touring RV, their studio investment, and their morale. Trower built a new recording studio, Weights and Measures Soundlab, and eventually remastered the synth-drenched album years later. Multiple PersonalitiesBass player Billy Smith and guitar/synth wizard Wade Williamson joined their ranks in 1999 to complete their 4th album “The Shattering” with producers Jason Livermore and Bill Stevenson (Descendents /Flag). After touring for that record, the band took a breather and worked on other projects through the 2000s, often together, releasing many albums with differing musical styles as Roman Numerals, Thee Water MoccaSins, Olympic Size, Sie Lieben Maschinen, and CoNoCo. 1-800-MELTDOWN is a return to their noise rock roots, released by Init Recordson limited-edition neon green vinyl for Record Store Day 2025.
Jed Harrelson
Nashville based soul artist Jed Harrelson has found a way to fuse sounds of Soul, Rock and R&B. Music connects and he carries that into the center of his work, leaving both a euphoric and familiar presence. While he’s independently released 12 songs in the last three years, he is working on a debut project right now. All of his music is recorded in house with his brother Hank as the audio engineer. Being from Texarkana, Arkansas instilled a drive to hone in on his craft though the lack of music scene caused him to move where he could really express his artistic message which took him to Fayetteville, Arkansas. This is where he cut his teeth in the Northwest Arkansas music scene. Now living in Nashville since January 2020, Jed is independently touring the country with his band in a gold van called ‘The Loaf”. By achieving and producing what feels good in his art, Jed just might help listeners do the same.
Bad Nerves
The bastard child of a Ramones/Strokes one night stand, Bad Nerves play ferociously fast distorted pop songs and drew acclaim with their previous releases ‘Dreaming’, ‘Baby Drummer’, & ‘Can’t Be Mine’. It would appear to be in the DNA of rock music, particularly punk music, that the music itself happens by some kind of happy accident. Nothing truer could be said of the Essex five piece speed punk band. For frontman Bobby, the formation of the band itself was an unintentional happenstance that just wound up taking off in unexpected but very exciting directions. Did band life choose Bad Nerves or did Bad Nerves choose band life? It’s hard to say. The boys are still reeling from their surprise success. Their self-made, self-funded debut put them in the hearts and minds of the cream of the alternative crop in 2020; from tastemakers such as Dan P Carter to Alyx Holcombe, and from peers like Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong to Pearl Jam’s Stone Gossard, Bad Nerves were instantaneously heralded with the poisoned chalice of saviours of a type of punk that promises to never die. They’ve toured with Royal Blood and The Darkness, and have drawn comparisons to Supergrass, the Ramones and Jay Reatard. And despite all that, their pop rock is a unique – and very fast – whack over the head that reminds us all of the future life left in hell-raising loud and fast music. Bad Nerves have been blazing at two hundred miles an hour across the live circuit for a few years now, and are showing no signs of slowing down. Despite the speed and chaotic nature of their music, they have taken great pride in challenging the traditional punk method, by playing tight and trying to replicate the sound of their record in the live setting. “We wanna deliver the songs well,” says bassist Jon. And that’s why people have taken notice. Bad Nerves set the bar much higher. One of the band’s most iconic gigs to date was a headliner at Sebright Arms in London in 2022, which was so electric they decided to release a live recording of it. “I’m surprised no one died that night,” says Jon. “That ceiling is so low! I’ve never seen so many people sweat. It was crazy. We were all sick afterwards.” The magic of rock music is in the chaos of the live performance. Bad Nerves understand that. They chase it. They crave it. They know how to create it. “My favourite Ramones record is the live one,” says Bobby. “The stakes are high. That’s what makes it.” The future is loud for Bad Nerves. They proactively seek to make the type of in-your-face, opposite-of-sterile, rock music that the genre was built on. They want to play as much as they can for as long as possible, in the hope of inspiring the next generation, before it’s too late. It feels as though they have arrived just in time.